100 Hours of: Fallout 4
I begin this essay with the admission that I haven’t watched the television series Fallout. This is because I don’t want to give Amazon any of my money, or at least least not more of my money. I’m as guilty as anybody who has looked around for something online, telling myself that I won’t give in to my corporate overlords who feed on my desire to feel the endorphin rush of a purchase that will temporarily make me feel whole and complete again before reality sinks back in and I remember I’m just a pawn in this not-fun, honestly lame cyberpunk existence I’m living in, and then once I can’t find it I just as quickly cave and buy it on Amazon. I also haven’t watched it because, and this may not be a popular opinion but I’ll say it anyway, not everything has to be a T.V. show, or a movie.
Sometimes a work in one particular medium is just fine as it is.
And Fallout 4 is definitely great at what it’s trying to do.
As of this writing Fallout 4 is almost ten years old and just writing that sentence makes my bones creak. Putting it in perspective “Almost ten years ago” I was in graduate school working towards a Masters degree in English and trying to become a teacher, and a writer in my spare time. “Almost ten years ago” I was married. “Almost ten years ago” I had begun hanging out with a rad dude who worked at a comic book shop who invited me to a book club all about comics. And“Almost ten years ago” I honestly wasn’t playing many videogames.
“Almost ten years later” I have that master’s degree, I tried being a teacher (and hated it), I work for a library, I’m a “published” writer who still churns out essays for a blog that (according to my analytics page) is largely frequented by me, I’m divorced, and I’m still friends with that rad dude who no longer works for that comic shop but IS studying to become a teacher in China.
None of that has any relevance to Fallout 4, it’s just a list of stuff that happened over a period of time.
But if I could make this argument: at some point most essays about videogames (or anything really) usually wind up being, at their core, a list of stuff that happened over a period of time.
They say (whoever they are(and why we listen to whoever “they” areI’m not sure(maybe they have nice pants))) that the first 100 days of a Presidency are the most important since they demonstrate the philosophical goals, and the measure of their ability to achieve stated goals for their leadership. I’d argue that if someone plays a videogame at and/or over 100 hours that more-or-less demonstrates the same qualities and convictions. There’s only a few games that I can say with any degree of certainty I’ve played that would reach that milestone, and since Fallout 4 is (as of this writing) drowning the zeitgeist with Pip-boys, ghouls, and Nuka Cola I might as well try to find some intellectual nugget of insight or reflection to toss into this ocean of thoughts that is the internet.
The question became, how would I do that?
And like any good question, the question itself revealed the answer.
I like structuring my writing around questions, and I like structuring conversations and essays around questions for whatever reason. It’s probably because I’m socially awkward and would always rather ask someone else anything and everything about themselves to avoid having to talk about myself. And, since this is my essay, I’ve decided to ask a few questions to dig into this time spent with Fallout 4. I hope you’ll indulge me.
Question #1: So, what is Fallout 4?
Fallout 4 is…many things.
Developed by Bethesda Game Studios and then published by Bethesda Softworks LLC on 10 November 2015, Fallout 4 is a science fiction videogame that is part of an ongoing series. The original Fallout videogame was released in 1997 for Macintosh personal computers and was a turn-based role playing game. Its sequel Fallout 2, which was released a year later in 1998, followed the same structure. The next main game in the series would be Fallout 3, released 28 October 2008, and while it was still a science fiction role playing game Bethesda dramatically altered the interface of the game by making it a 3D open world game with real-time combat thus setting stage for what would eventually be Fallout 4.
That’s the general production history, but it doesn’t quite answer the question completely.
Image of Disc art provided by The Cover Project website
Fallout 4 is a first-person shooter but can also be third person if the player (like me) prefers a behind-view perspective. But shooting is only one verb of this game(I’ll talk about verbs in more depth later in this essay) because it’s also a role playing game(RPG) in that it allows you dialog options and choices that allow players the chance to role play a persona. The game is also an open-world sandbox because while there is a main narrative, there is also a seemingly endless expanse of territory to explore that is filled with puzzles, bunkers, caves, enemy non-playable characters(NPCs), and thousands if not millions of containers filled with random items that can clutter up an inventory before anyone could even say the word Skyrim.
That’s the genre down, now let’s tackle the story.
The meat, or content of Fallout 4 is a science-fiction narrative with plenty of inspiration from the retro sci-fi of the 40s and 50s. It tells the story of a Survivor, a man or woman who is simply living their existence in the year 2077. There’s been steadily growing tension between the United States and Communist China, and after speaking with a representative of Vault Tec a corporation which builds underground bunkers in the event of “total nuclear annihilation” there is an alarm and the Survivors sprint to Vault 111 as nuclear bombs are literally dropping. The survivors only have a moment to change into their iconic blue Vault suits before they’re placed in pods which they’re told will be temporary. In fact Vault-Tec is using Vault 111 to experiment on human beings, specifically to observe the effects of long term cryostasis. This freezing period is interrupted when the survivor is awakened to see strangers in the vault opening the container of their spouse who is holding their infant child Shaun. One of them wears a kind of radiation suit, while the other is a bald man with a deep scar on his face wearing a black shirt and holding a revolver. The spouse refuses to give up the baby and is promptly shot and killed. The cryostasis is reactivated and remains so until the year 2287, 210 years after the original freezing. The Survivor, dedicated to finding their baby, fight their way out of the vault which is filled with giant cockroaches and steps out into the ruins of the Commonwealth (shorthand for the territory of the Northeast United States around the city of Boston).
From there, as Cole Porter sings regularly on Diamond City radio, “Anything goes.”
Now that I’ve established what Fallout 4 is, it seems appropriate to ask the next question.
Question #2 What can you do in Fallout 4?
I love bullet points as a structuring device in writing. They have such a lovely visual charm and not enough writers use them. So, if you’ll indulge me (again) I’ll make a quick list of activities I performed over 100 hours of playing Fallout 4:
I learned to shoot guns using the VATS targeting system.
I found a lost german shepard named DogMeat who became my best friend.
I rebuilt several towns and settlements using scrap like aluminum cans, typewriters, and desk fans by turning them into generators, water purification machines, and even AI controlled machine gun turrets.
I found a kid who’d been stuck in a refrigerator for 200 years and reunited him with his parents.
I fired miniature nuclear warheads aptly referred to as “Mini-nukes” at a group of cannibalistic raiders.
I helped a fascist military organization build a giant jingoistic robot named Liberty Prime who throws small nuclear warheads like a football.
I collected bobbleheads of Vault-Boy, the corporate mascot of the Vault-Tec corporation.
I killed the man who killed my husband…five times.
I befriended and then fell in love with a woman named Piper who’s a maligned reporter in Diamond City trying to inform the public about the dangers of the world, and she fell in love with me.
I built and upgraded at least seven different types of firearms ranging from a 10mm pistol to a 5.56mm assault rifle.
I found a crashed flying saucer and followed a trail of green blood to an alien who was hiding in a cave who tried to kill me. I killed it instead and took its gun and then promptly never used it.
I befriended a robot named Curie who wanted to become human, and once she transitioned her consciousness to a human body I fell in love with her, and she fell in love with me.
I killed giant mosquitos, giant flies, giant scorpions, and giant bipedal lizards named Deathclaws and turned them into taxidermied trophies.
I drank well over 100 bottles of Nuka Cola, Nuka Cola Cherry, and Nuka Cola Quantum.
I found my son after discovering the secret, underground society/research facility known only as The Institute and discovered that he had changed so much since I last saw him.
I met an enslaved, drug addicted woman named Cait who fought raiders in a pseudo-gladiatorial style combat, freed her from her “owner,” helped her free herself from her drug addiction, and fell in love with her. And she fell in love with me.
I collected Grognak comic books.
I fought an army of giant mutated crabs to reclaim a colonial fort for the Minutemen who were trying to bring order and stability to the Commonwealth.
I met a Super Mutant named Strong who was searching for something called the “Milk of Human Kindness” and took him on my adventures…and he never liked me.
I could honestly keep going because this list doesn’t even contain half of the events that transpired on the several playthroughs of Fallout 4 that I played. I didn’t even mention any of the events and actions that transpired while I spent time in Nuka World or Far Harbor. But lists are only ever interesting for so long. Besides, the next question has become painfully relevant after looking at this list of actions and events.
Question #3: What does Fallout 4 offer the player?
The short answer is everything.
The long answer is…well, everything.
More than anything Fallout 4 offers the players a seemingly endless series of “verbs.”
The videogame designer and critic Tim Rogers uses the term “verbs” and/or “flavors” frequently to discuss videogames, specifically the actions that players are capable of performing while playing, noting that games will always have at least two “verbs” or “flavors.” I have a Masters Degree in English and not the culinary arts so I’m going to employ the term “verbs” while discussing this game.
“Exploring” is, at least in my playthroughs of Fallout 4, the main “verb.” Most of my playthroughs, even at their most exciting, or the most tedious, involve moving my Survivor (who I named Judy (because I’m a Twin Peaks fan)) everywhere and anywhere. The world of Fallout 4 is intricately detailed from the rusted remains of cars on the eroded highways, the vines and moss growing up the sides of derelict skyscrapers, ruined buildings filled with bookshelves and computers that are often miraculously still working, and the “Glowing Sea” which is nothing but a barren wasteland of pure radiation where nothing lives but wild monsters. The appeal of the Fallout series is exploring a world that’s been obliterated and slowly remade in the ruins of what once was, and I’ve loved walking and running through this simulated reality just exploring the open and interior worlds.
Fallout 4 embodies the open-world videogame to the best and worst possible implication. Stepping out of Vault 111 the player is encouraged to go straight to their home town of Sanctuary Hills, but technically speaking the player can do whatever they want.
In the interest of buying completely into the concept of exploring the open world I tried in one of my playthroughs to avoid going straight to Sanctuary Hills after leaving the Vault; I elected to hug the walls of the map and head East. I didn’t get very far because I stumbled across a raider and his dog who one-punched my unarmored Survivor and I started back at my last autosave. Still, this experiment was enough to convince me that Fallout 4 did philosophically promise the player more freedom than the traditional model of videogames which keep players locked in a tutorial mode until the game quote “really starts.”
“Exploring” is the main verb, but there’s a profusion of verbs in Fallout 4.
The freedom of movement and choice make exploring Fallout 4 enjoyable, but “exploring” will inevitably lead the player to new verbs because once I have explored a new region new choices emerge. Sometimes I will stumble across a pack of wild ghouls or a Raider camp (usually obvious from dead bodies hanging from meat-hooks). At this juncture “explore” immediately shifts to “run” or “fight,” and the latter verb may include “shoot,” “punch,” “stab,” or “swing.” “Fighting” is an enjoyable verb in Fallout 4 and possibly the one used the most right after “explore.” I note that “fighting” is fun in Fallout 4 largely because of the VATS system (which is an acronym for Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System) which allows the player to temporarily slow time and select limbs of an opponent to shoot, and if the player times their shots accurately and timely they’re rewarded with slow-motion sequences that will even create cinematic action shots.
“Fighting” in Fallout 4 is, simply put, a flipping blast.
But sometimes instead of finding violence, I’ll discover NPCs who are just survivors who afford me the chance to start Side-Quests.
I note as a small aside that while I was researching for this essay I read several reviews of Fallout 4 and consistently the Side-Quests received the most positive reviews. Kotaku, PC Gamer, and IGN all dedicated sections in their reviews of the game just to this aspect of the gameplay. And if my 100 hours are proof of anything it’s at least able to concur with this recommendation.
Fallout 4’s sidequests are freaking rad dude.
There’s a side quest about a serial killer who uses his victims blood to make paintings. There’s a side quest about robots who are trying to make the USS Constitution fly by strapping rockets to the back of them. There’s a side quest about an actor who’s been kidnapped by Super-Mutants and is being held at the top of a skyscraper. There’s a side quest about a group of raiders who have set up shop in an old high school decorating it with spikes and heads on stakes(....so, basically high school). There’s a side quest about helping a little girl in a Vault find her lost cat that then leads to another side quest about saving the Vault dwellers from a mysterious disease.
Each of these side quests open up opportunities for more verbs because while “exploring” and “fighting” will define most of a side-quest, the player will also “gather” various items to help to “build” settlements as well as “craft” items and/or upgrades to their firearms and weapons. Locked doors and boxes will allow the player to “lockpick,” and computers in the world can be “hacked” which in turn will provide the player with background details that they can “read” to learn more about what has happened to this world. Likewise players are sure to stumble across trinkets such as tape recordings, bobbleheads, and comics that can provide the player with new skills or additions to their skill tree and thus the verb “collect” emerges.
Fallout 4 offers the player so many different verbs, sometimes to a degree that it sacrifices a cohesive structure. Put another way, sometimes the sheer amount of options becomes paralyzing.
It’s easy to enter the game planning to explore the ruins of Boston and then wind up killing an hour or more building up a settlement with houses, defenses, and general comforts like electricity. Likewise the skill tree option can wind up killing time as players have to decide whether or not they want to create a charismatic or physically strong protagonist. Many have criticized this aspect of the game, and I’ll admit that I’m guilty of falling prey to the time-vampire that is the open world game.
I’m not fond of dwelling on negative elements though so I’ll leave others to criticize this component of the game. Or at least criticize it with more nuance.
There is bloat to the world and gameplay of Fallout 4, and I won’t deny that, but again, I fall back on the 100 hours I’ve spent with it because that suggests more than just falling into the “open world videogame” whole. It suggests conviction.
So, with that in mind let’s tackle the next question.
Question #4 Why did I give Fallout 4 100 hours?
I’ll answer this question after a brief story.
My ex-brother-in-law bought Fallout 4 and was playing it one night. He was fond of electronics and enjoyed showing off the latest screen-based item or accessory he had acquired after hours working for some retail location. I suppose you could say he “grinded” until his financial stats allowed him to upgrade his gadgets. While he was living with my ex-wife and I one evening he turned on the living room television set and returned to his room while I continued to try and read Absalom, Absalom by William Faulkner for a class I was taking about the “Southern Gothic'' in American literature. Somewhere in that beautiful, albeit kafkaesque stream-of-consciousness prose I became aware of movement in my peripheral vision. This became too distracting and I looked up to observe that he had hooked up his gaming system to the living room television set and was more or less streaming his playthrough to me. The grotesqueries of the upper class south and the implosion of a family took a backseat as eventually I found myself watching my brother-in-law attempting to stalk through the ruins of Lexington and instead stumbled right into the path of about seven ghouls.
What’s important about this playthrough was his choice of armament. He had, in terms of weapons, only a crank-powered laser rifle.
He tried his best, poor soul, but after a few seconds I watched his character hit the ground stone dead and the ghouls immediately froze their attacking behavior and stood about waiting for the next protagonist to appear to trigger their AI. If my memory serves correctly he quit the game after two more tries and I returned to my book.
After finishing it I never read Absalom, Absalom ever again. I did buy a copy of Fallout 4 though.
My refusal to return to the works of William Faulkner, and my decision to spend approximately 4.16667 days playing Fallout 4 seems to speak for itself and answer the above question.
But, just so it’s clear, I’ll answer the question plainly: I just enjoyed playing Fallout 4.
Occam's Razor dude. It’s a thing.
Attempting more nuance I think about the collected moments of playing the game and I see myself spending hours just building settlements, fighting raiders, and going on Side-Quests.
I completed one of the possible main storylines, specifically the Brotherhood of Steel story arc because they had Liberty Prime(the giant jingoistic robot I mentioned earlier). If I had to play it through to the end again, I would probably choose the Railroad or the Minutemen because these options seem the most morally sound ones given the fact that the other two involve allying myself with borderline fascists or borderline techno fascists with eugenic ideals.
I enjoyed the characters immensely with Piper being my all time favorite character because, honestly, she seemed the most human and her character animations were better than just about any other character in the game. The humanity of a woman who was trying to make the world a better place by telling people the facts and truth of existence is admirable and again and again I would play the game, pushing myself to Diamond City just so that I could get her as a companion.
I enjoyed exploring the Commonwealth with Dogmeat, listening to Diamond City radio, and discovering some new space on the map.
Reflecting on these moments, and putting aside the emotional satisfaction of this game, I come away with the intellectual impression that above all things else Fallout 4 is a videogame that creates and inspires hope in the player.
The game begins with war, nuclear annihilation, death of loved ones, and a sheer overwhelming sense that everything is ending. 100 hours later this initial impression fades because I’ve had Judy reorganize the Minutemen, I’ve had her build settlements with farms and defenses, I’ve had her meet and help countless citizens across the Commonwealth, and I’ve had her form new connections which can become friendships and some that will become romantic partners. Fallout 4 is a game that encourages exploration of a seemingly dead world, but soon enough the world will become remade in a new likeness that leaves the player with a sense that the world is healing.
The blasts of nuclear ruin won’t ever completely fade, and the people of this world won’t completely stop being broken. But by pushing through that pain, and establishing new connections, the Commonwealth, its people, and Judy herself will eventually heal.
With that, there’s only one last question to ask.
Question #5: Is there anything else to say?
This essay was nowhere near as intellectually driven as I had hoped it to be. Instead it became reflective and a tad more personal that I’m really comfortable with. Still, given the time spent with this game it’s ludicrous to assume that I would have no emotional reaction to it.
Fallout 4 is a game with robots, mech armor, a cute german shepherd, scores of side-quests, collectibles, and enough “verbs” to fill up half of my grandmother’s dictionary. But all of these superficial aspects all collect together to create a videogame that has occupied my attention long enough that I somehow managed to spend almost enough hours to become five whole days worth of my life playing it.
If the worst aspect of open world videogames is that they are nothing more than reality simulators where we occupy time then Fallout 4 would certainly fit that description. But after all the time spent within it I come away satisfied and hopeful.
Time and choice is ultimately all human beings have in this life. What we do with that time, and the choices we make aren’t just the nature of life, they reflect our values, beliefs, and convictions. 100 hours is enough time to make plenty of interesting choices, and also enough time to remind folks that no matter how great the television series Fallout may be, there’s nothing compared to the simulation of hopping into a suit of power armor and fighting a deathclaw with a minigun themselves.
Joshua “Jammer” Smith
7.4.2024
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